Ashley and Josh’s trash-the-dress session - loved this sunset!

At last - I’m posting about my journey to Aruba.

Tiffany and Dustin along with their family and friends flew from the Boston area to celebrate their wedding in the lovely country of Aruba.  It was a great privilege for me to be a part of their destination wedding experience - I’m glad Tiffany invited me to photograph their special day!

They were married on the Canadian Thanksgiving weekend and we started off our series of photo shoots with a Trash-the-Dress session.  Tiffany wore a different dress for this session (obviously!).  T & D were up for a sunrise session which turned out to be spectacular as you will see.  Tiffany’s mom picked me up at my hotel around 6am when it was still pitch black out.  Aruba is a nice little place to drive around in and unlike many Caribbean countries, you generally don’t have to worry about getting clobbered with a baseball bat!

Here are a just a few photos from our session on October 8, 2010.  I’ve posted a few similar photos in both colour and black & white because sometimes it’s just too hard to decide.

Ok, so we almost drove by this super fun tree, but I knew if we didn’t stop for a few photos, I would live to regret it. LOVED this location! I “think” this is a dying Divi-divi tree, but don’t quote me on it.

Hello photogenic waves.

The famous lighthouse in Aruba.

A “special” photo session from Aruba will be posted next!

I arrived back home on Monday evening from shooting Ashley and Josh’s wedding at Dreams Punta Cana Resort in the D.R. last Friday - so good to be on Canadian soil again……

Ashley and Josh’s wedding was actually the last one for my 2010 season so now I can unstress myself, relax and get caught up on all my editing!

Hurricane Paula thankfully had no affect on our weather.

Here is a sneak peek from Ashley and Josh’s trash-the-dress session:

Samandy and Manny’s wedding was the 7th wedding I’ve photographed in Punta Cana, Dominican Republic. It was also the 5th wedding I’ve photographed at the Majestic Colonial/Elegance Resort. One of my goals when shooting in the Dominican Republic is to ensure I try new things so everyone’s wedding images don’t end up looking all the same.  As a photographer, it’s a good thing to challenge yourself during each and every shoot.  As you will soon see, there was a very different component during S & M’s TTD session : )

We agreed to meet the morning after their wedding at 6am.  The clock in Samandy and Manny’s room was set wrong so when they thought is was 6am, it was actually still 5am!  They waited outside in the dark for over an hour - ooops!  (Kind of funny, but it really wasn’t).  It was still too dark at 6am so we didn’t actually start shooting until 6:30am.  I am the furthest thing from a morning person so sunrise sessions are a challenge for me right there.  To top it all off, I only got about 3 hours sleep because I spent the night downloading all my memory cards onto my laptop and backing up the images for extra safety before going to sleep.  Contrary to popular belief, destination weddings are not a vacation for wedding photographers.

Here are just a few of the images from Samandy and Manny’s Sunrise Trash-the-Dress Session - enjoy!

I guess it’s not obvious that it’s brutally early in the morning here since Samandy and Manny are giggling like school kids : )

I think there’s a really good chance they might end up having really cute kids! : )

Loooove this one - the H20 almost looks delicious here.

One of those images that looks fab in colour and black & white - I still can’t decide.

They were such great sports - going in and out of the water.

And willing to do pretty much anything for the shoot!  I love working with couples that are eager beavers.

The biggest advantage of doing these sessions at sunrise is that there is barely anyone around to distract you.

Lost.

I was so glad this palm tree was still here - it is just super cool.

I always like to do my rendition of “Blue Lagoon” (a family friendly version of course). Samandy and Manny weren’t even close to being born when that movie was out though!

Ok, now that you are over the complete shock they actually ripped and tore the dress, try not to judge. Personally, I think there are worse things than ripping a wedding dress - like married couples that don’t wear their wedding bands - actually, don’t get me started on that! : (  If I was a wedding cop (if such occupation existed), I would gladly hand out demerit points to married couples that don’t wear their weddings bands “because it’s just a piece of jewelry”. Sigh. Major pet peeve.

Tearing the dress actually wasn’t for our photo shoot. Since Samandy’s dress was soaking wet, it was SUPER heavy and hard to move around in so removing a few layers just made things easier. I thought while I was standing there, I might as well document it.

We wrapped up the session on this fun bed of coconuts.

By the time we finished, it was almost 9:30am. Samandy and Manny were total troopers and very fun to work with!  I really love working with couples like S & M that are willing to push the envelope with me.  Congratulations to both of them for committing their lives to each other with the blessing of marriage.  They flew home the next day and then were off to a fabulous honeymoon in Paris!

Although my visit was short, it was sweet and I was super honoured that Samandy and Manny invited me to tell the story of their destination wedding experience in the Dominican Republic.  I was truly thrilled to be a part of their wedding day!  I hope you have enjoyed viewing their images.

My next 2 destination weddings are scheduled for later this year, so there is more tropical fun to come!

I just spent the weekend (Thursday to Sunday) in the Dominican Republic shooting Samandy and Manny’s wedding at the Majestic Elegance Resort.

I booked my trip with AirCanada Vacations and was pleasantly surprised that I was upgraded to Executive Class at no extra charge!  Flying First Class is a much more enjoyable experience especially if you have long legs because the extra leg room is like heaven ; )  The flight attendants also really treat you like you are an extra special person - they always addressed me as “Ms. Wight”.  They sure don’t address you by name in Economy Class!  I really hope I can fly First Class sometime again.

The turbulence on my flight to Punta Cana was extremely unpleasant.  We had constant turbulence for 1 hour straight (seriously - constant bumps and jiggles non-stop), it stopped for about 10 minutes and then went for another hour.  Originally we were told it was only going to last for 20 minutes, but it went on for 2 hours.  I was totally nauseated and thought I was going to throw-up.  I almost couldn’t even LOOK at the yummy breakfast they served me and unfortunately I barely touched it.  Next time I go to Shopper’s Drug Mart I need to see if they make pills for air motion sickness because I don’t want to go through that again on my next trips to the Caribbean.  Thankfully, my flight back to Toronto on Sunday was a much smoother ride.

I also need to find out why whenever I go down south I come back with incredibly puffy ankles.  My ankles were like balloons on my flight back and actually still are right now (as well as my feet).  My legs are somewhat swollen as well.  I am also suffering from alot of sand flea bites (at least that’s what I’m passing it off as) so my legs and arms are incredibly itchy.  Hopefully this all goes away soon.

I am really looking forward to sharing a slew of images with you from Samandy and Manny’s wedding, but for now, here is a small sneak peek from their sunrise trash-the-dress session we did (starting at 6:30am!!!).